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To Roast a Turkey

A roasted turkey prepared with butter, water, flour, and stuffing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

To Roast a Turkey

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Clean and prepare the turkey, trussing it as needed.

  2. Fill the turkey's cavity with your choice of moist dressing, preferably chestnut stuffing.

  3. Place the turkey in a roasting pan and dredge it thoroughly with flour.

  4. Add 2 tablespoons of butter and 4 tablespoons of boiling water to the pan.

Roast and brown

  1. Set the pan in a 350°F (175°C) oven, covering the turkey with a second pan to prevent burning.

  2. Baste frequently and monitor the temperature to avoid burning or drying out the turkey.

  3. Roast for 1 hour and 30 to 45 minutes, allowing about 10 minutes per pound.

  4. When nearly done, remove the top pan and baste again until well-browned.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Turkey + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,592 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Turkey + livertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together190 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  4. Butter + livertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Turkey + flourtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together963 recipes

    Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Turkey
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking through in the oven as the centerpiece.
Flour
Dredging coats the skin, helping it brown and form a crisp surface.
Butter
Adds fat to the pan, enriching flavor and helping the surface brown.

The step that matters

Baste frequently and watch the temperature. Basting keeps the surface moist and the pan liquid, while monitoring the temperature prevents overcooking. Lean poultry dries out and burns easily if left unattended over a long roast.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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